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Food Security Policy AdviceSummary of a Lessons Learned Studyon three German TC Policy Advisory Projectsin Cambodia, Ethiopia and Mozambique1August 20061 Dr. Manfred Metz, Consultant, is the main author of this overview summary which is based on theLessons Learned Study, consisting of a summary report and three country reports; these reports wereprepared under the leadership of Michael Hagedorn, Consultant, in cooperation with Dr. InesReinhard, Adviser, GTZ Division 42, Priority Area Development-oriented Emergency Aid and KlausPilgram, Senior Adviser, GTZ Division 45, Section Policy Consultancy in the Agriculture, Fisheriesand Food Sector, between September 2005 and May 2006. 1

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1. IntroductionFood and nutrition security (FNS) is a basic human right and a prerequisite for development.More than 800 million people in the world suffer from hunger and malnutrition. In most cases,food and nutrition (FN) insecurity is caused by structural factors such as poverty, foodproduction not keeping pace with population growth, natural resource degradation, theHIV/AIDS pandemic, and the neglect of rural areas in infrastructure and public serviceprovision. Furthermore, structural FN insecurity is often aggravated by man-made andnatural disasters.Tackling the problem of FN insecurity requires appropriate interventions at all levels (macro,meso and micro), taking into account all the factors that have an impact on access to food,food availability, use and utilisation, and stability. For more than 30 years, the DeutscheGesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH has been providing support toimprove the FN situation in many countries. Apart from other types of support in the field ofFNS (e.g. integrated food security projects (IFSPs), emergency and refugee food security(FS) operations), several specific FS policy advisory projects (FSPAPs) were introducedsome years ago with the aim of ensuring that FNS issues are duly considered at theinstitutional and policy level, and in order to support governments in the formulation andimplementation of food security policies and strategies.Due to restructuring within both the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment (BMZ) and GTZ, the existing FS advisory projects have been phased out as“stand-alone” projects by the end of 2005. In future, as far as German developmentcooperation (DC) is concerned, food and nutrition security aspects are to be integrated intoregular technical cooperation (TC) programmes and projects in fields such as ruraldevelopment, health, education and social development. In order to facilitate such integrationand to make use of the relevant experience gained, a “lessons learned” study of the FSpolicy advisory projects was conducted in Cambodia (CAM), Ethiopia (ETH), andMozambique (MOZ) at the end of 2005, before the respective projects in these threecountries had come to an end.This summary report highlights the major findings of the Lessons Learned Study anddraws some conclusions, particularly focusing on those aspects which are of generalimportance for the integration of FNS issues into future DC and TC projects andprogrammes.2. Relevance of FS Policy Advisory SupportPolicy advisory support in the field of FNS was provided in all three countries with thefollowing objectives: 1) To address existing problems with FNS, 2) To meet FNS objectives in national development policies, strategies and programmes, 3) To meet FNS objectives underpinned by the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Declaration and the “Right to Food” debate. 3

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Regarding 1), there have been serious problems with food and nutrition insecurity in all threecountries, which translates into a high number of people living below the poverty line (ranging from 35% of the population in CAM to over 50% in ETH and MOZ) and high rates of malnutrition in children under five, leading to stunting, wasting, and underweight children. Moreover, structural food insecurity problems have been compounded by recurrent natural disasters (droughts and floods).Regarding 2), the governments of all three countries set out food security objectives and formulated food (and nutrition) security strategies based on existing FNS problems and encouraged by the World Food Summit in 1996. However, FNS issues were initially largely treated as a special or sectoral issue, with little integration into other national development policies, strategies and programmes.Regarding 3), the proclamation and adoption of the MDGs and the “Right to Food” debate have further contributed to raising the awareness of policymakers concerning FNS as an issue that needs to be addressed in the context of national development policies.While MDG 1 (“Eradicate hunger and poverty”) directly and explicitly addresses poverty andfood insecurity, the other MDGs also have the following implications in terms of FNS:• MDG 2: Achieve universal primary education: Malnourished children are less likely to enrol in, attend, or be attentive at school; and are less likely to perform to their potential, or to complete the school cycle.• MDG 3: Promote gender equality and empower women: The cycle of hunger and poverty can only be broken if women are empowered to perform their role and functions in the household as well as in economy and society. To do this, they must have equal rights and control over resources and opportunities.• MDG 4: Reduce child mortality: Malnutrition is directly or indirectly associated with child mortality, and is the main contributor to the burden of disease.• MDG 5: Improve maternal health: Maternal health is compromised by intra- household food distribution patterns among family members which are generally unfavourable to women, especially when the amount of food to be shared is limited; malnutrition is also associated with most major risk factors for maternal and child mortality, and for healthy child development.• MDG 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases: Malnutrition weakens resistance to infections and reduces malarial survival rates.• MDG 7: Ensure environmental sustainability: The poor and hungry are often compelled to pursue practices for their own physical survival that contribute to natural resource depletion. In turn, natural resource depletion and environmental degradation represent a major threat to long-term food security. 4

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By adopting the “Voluntary Guidelines for the Right to Food”2 (2004), all 187 Food andAgriculture Organization (FAO) member countries have gone a step further than achievingthe MDGs and accepted the right to sufficient and adequate food, not only as a basic humanright, but also a legal right, making national governments formally committed to achieving thistarget.Coupled with increased awareness of FNS issues and the close links to poverty alleviation, amajor concern shared by all the FSPAPs was the need to integrate FNS strategies better andmore explicitly into the formulation and implementation of national Poverty ReductionStrategies (PRSs) and other national development policies, strategies and programmes,which is discussed in the next section.3. Integration of FNS into national development policies, strategiesand programmesFNS is a cross-cutting issue, encompassing the following four aspects (also called pillars ordimensions of FNS): • Access: Economic access is closely related to employment, income, poverty and social protection; while physical access is closely related to rural infrastructure and marketing; • Availability: This aspect is closely related to agricultural and food production, and is from a longer-term perspective also related to natural resource conservation; • Use and utilisation: This is closely related to health, nutrition, clean water supply, sanitation and education; • Stability:3 This refers to emergency responses, including relief food aid, in case of man- made or natural disasters as well as seasonal and annual variations in production, supply and demand.2 Voluntary Guidelines to support the progressive realisation of the right to adequate food in the context ofnational food security (127th Session of the FAO Council, Rome, November 2004).3 “Stability“ was not mentioned in the Lessons Learned Study as an extra aspect/dimension of FNS; rather, it hasbeen treated, as is the case in many FNS concepts, as inherent in the other three aspects. 5

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If FNS is perceived in such a comprehensive manner, almost all national developmentpolicies, strategies and programmes clearly have a bearing on FNS, as Graph 1 illustrates.Graph 1: Fields of Overlap between National Development Policies/ Strategies/Programmes and FNS Poverty Millennium Reduction National Development Development Strategy Goals Strategy/Plan Social Sector Emergency Policies & Programmes Strategies (Disaster (e.g. Education, Management, Health) Food Aid) UN/Donor Regional Country Agricultural & Development Programmes Rural Develop- Programmes & Strategies ment Policies & StrategiesSource: Graph adapted from M. Metz, draft Food Security Policies & Strategies for Lesotho, Sierra Leone andTimor Leste, prepared 2004/5.The many linkages which exist between the various national developmentpolicies/strategies/programmes and FNS call for FNS concerns to be incorporated into theformulation and implementation of these policies, strategies and programmes. The FSPAPshave helped raise awareness of the need for such integration, and have facilitated theestablishment and functioning of coordination and cooperation structures and mechanisms.With the limited personnel and time inputs available, however, it was clear that the FSPAPscould not possibly work on all fronts, thus impeding the full integration of FNS into therelevant national development policies, strategies and programmes. Therefore, somestrategic fields of intervention were selected which appeared to be the most crucial forachieving better integration under the specific conditions of the countries concerned. Theseintervention fields were as follows: • Improvement of the information basis on FNS issues for FNS assessment, monitoring and evaluation (CAM, MOZ), • Better integration of FNS into the PRSP process (CAM, MOZ), 6

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• FNS capacity building at central and decentralised levels (all countries; the decentralised or regional level was particularly important in Ethiopia), • Organisational development and promotion of coordination structures (CAM, MOZ), • Natural resource protection and sustainable land use (ETH), • Nutrition, particularly micro-nutrient assessment and interventions (CAM).4. Institutional issuesThe cross-cutting nature of FNS theoretically calls for an institutional body to partner theFSPAPs that has a kind of umbrella function and is able to coordinate all government (andother) institutions that are relevant for FNS. This, however, was not the case in any of thethree countries. In each case, all FSPAPs were attached to one line ministry as the projectpartner (the Ministry of Planning (MoP) in Cambodia, the Ministry of Agriculture and RuralDevelopment (MoARD) in Ethiopia, and the Ministry of Agriculture, later renamed theMoARD, in Mozambique).From the outset, this attachment to one line ministry made it difficult to convince the otherrelevant ministries and organisations to embark on FNS as a common theme. Many effortswere required – and actually made – by FS policy advisers to reach out to other relevantstakeholders (e.g. the Council for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) in Cambodia)and achieve a (more) effective coordination among them (different government departments,donors, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and other relevant national andinternational organisations). These efforts were, at least, partially successful in the sense thatsome kinds of coordination mechanisms for FNS have been established and strengthenedwith project support. This particularly refers to the technical working groups on FNS whichhave been formed at national level in all three countries and are promoted by the FSPAPs.Possible impacts on the highest level of political decision-makers are, however, less obvious.Apart from institutional coordination at the national level, coordination structures andmechanisms at the decentralised level have been promoted in all three countries. In Ethiopia,particular efforts have also been made to promote cooperation and exchange of experiencebetween the regions.5. Linking FS policy advice with other interventions and supportmeasures – An issue of effectivenessAlthough formally organised as stand-alone projects, all three FSPAPs were not confined tomerely providing advisory support, but were provided with a budget to implement pilotmeasures and to test innovative approaches in the field. Furthermore, the FSPAPs in two ofthe three countries (Cambodia and Ethiopia) were designed as a sort of follow-up to (andpartly overlapping with) other GTZ-supported food security programmes. Linking policyadvice to interventions in the field in this fashion has several advantages, all of whichcontribute to rendering the policy advisory function more effective. As a result, 7

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• innovative approaches to improving FNS can be tested; • if successful, results can be demonstrated and the approaches replicated; • if tangible results are produced, the project attracts more attention from the public, other stakeholders and policymakers; • the project gains greater publicity, probably better funding, and thus could potentially achieve a greater impact.The list of innovations made by the three projects is quite impressive, ranging from foodfortification in Cambodia, 13 technical innovations in Ethiopia, and the development of atoolbox for decentralised planning and implementation in Mozambique. Also, importantcross-cutting issues like gender/empowerment of women, HIV/AIDS-mainstreaming, crisisprevention/disaster management could be integrated into the project design, particularly inETH and MOZ. Such innovations have been partly produced in connection with otherGerman-assisted rural development programmes; the link between the different TCcomponents helped realise synergies in terms of further dissemination as well as integrationinto the national FNS strategies, and assisted in making them operational.It can be concluded that policy, like any other type of advisory support, is likely to be moreeffective if combined with the provision of funds for implementing, testing and demonstratingrelevant innovative measures in practice. This calls for a programme approach with differentcomponents. The resources needed to fund the different programme components do notnecessarily have to come from just one donor; donor harmonisation, as stipulated by theParis Declaration (whereby different donors make complementary contributions, taking intoaccount their comparative advantages), can also work well here, alongside tripartitecooperation arrangements.6. Capacity buildingCapacity building was a core activity and objective of all three projects. Based on anassessment of training needs, a wide scope of training topics was offered, ranging fromawareness creation and better understanding of the concept of FNS through to the planningand implementation of FNS projects (including applications of the innovative approachesdeveloped) in the field. An important contribution in this respect was offered by InWent(Capacity Building International, Germany)4. The target groups of the training measurescomprised government staff of relevant ministries and institutions at headquarters anddecentralised levels, NGO staff, community representatives and field staff.As a result of the training measures, a critical mass of government officials and members ofother organisations at all levels was familiarised with the concept of FNS and its application.This enabled these individuals to put FNS issues into the context of national development, toassess their relevance, and to design, plan, implement and monitor FNS interventions at thedifferent levels. Participants of training programmes explicitly articulated the benefits theyderived from the projects.4 cf. InWEnt, K. Klennert (ed.), Achieving Food and Nutrition Security: A Training Course Reader, Feldafing 2005. 8

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7. Conditions for sustainabilityNow that the last three German-supported FSPAPs have come to an end, one key questionremains: what permanent changes have been induced by these interventions, i.e. will therebe a sustainable impact leading to improved FNS? Although this question cannot beanswered firmly at this stage, assumptions can be made in terms of important conditionswhich must be in place if the results achieved are to have a sustainable impact. Four majorconditions can be identified in this regard: 1) Political will 2) Appropriate institutional set-ups and coordination mechanisms 3) The capacity to deal with FNS issues 4) Further donor support for FNS interventions.These four conditions can be assessed in detail as follows:1) The problems of food and nutrition insecurity have not yet diminished; indeed, they are still prevalent and continue to pose a major humanitarian and development threat. It can be assumed that this fact will be clearly reiterated during the forthcoming “World Food Summit – 10 Years After”, reinforcing the political will of all sides (governments of countries with prevailing FN insecurity, the international community) to do something (or to do more than before) about this issue.2) Proper treatment of FNS issues at policy level requires an appropriate institutional set-up and effective coordination mechanisms. The projects have worked towards this end and have made progress, particularly on the technical level. However, further efforts must be made to integrate FNS aspects and concerns more successfully into the PRS processes and overall national development planning, which in turn requires initiatives from the highest political decision-making level. This may happen if Condition 1 above applies, and could possibly be promoted by further FNS policy advisory support at the political decision-making level.3) Effective FNS interventions depend on competent government staff at all levels. Again, the projects have been successful in building capacity, but more remains to be done. In this context, it is particularly important that existing capacities are actually challenged and used, i.e. that FNS remains a prominent topic on the political agenda of these countries, and leads to appropriate action at all levels. This again depends on the two above-mentioned conditions, in conjunction with Condition 4 mentioned below:4) Taking into account the dimensions and severity of FN insecurity in the low-income, food-deficit countries, including the three countries covered by the previous FSPAPs, it would be unrealistic to assume that this problem can be solved purely using the countries’ own resources and capacities. The governments of the countries concerned have to take decisive steps, but further and significant support will be required from the international community. Once again, this also depends on the requirements mentioned under Condition 1 above, namely the respective political will, in this case referring to donor countries. 9

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8. Overall conclusion and outlookOverall, the following conclusions can be drawn from the Lessons Learned Study: FS policyadvice as provided under the FSPAPs was relevant in terms of addressing existing needsand development priorities; effective in terms of inducing changes designed to improve theFNS situation; efficient, if combined with implementation of relevant actions; and sustainablein terms of the results achieved, assuming continued political will and available resources forFNS interventions.Effective FNS policy advice requires awareness of FNS issues, political will andendorsement at a high political level. Such conditions must be there from the outset sincethey cannot be generated by a single project. To foster such conditions, the international anddonor community must make a concerted effort to enhance political dialogue with thegovernments in question, backed up with a commitment to provide substantial support.Policy advice works from the central through the regional and down to the local level, andvice versa. Particularly important from the central to the decentralised levels is thebreakdown of the national FNS objectives and concept into regional strategies and localactions, while the feedback of information on innovative approaches and best practices fromthe field to the district, regional and national levels helps integrate such experience intonational and regional FNS strategies and makes them operational.There is a need and scope for further support in this field under international DC, particularlyin terms of: • offering FS policy advice at the political decision-making level; • combining FS policy advice with the implementation of relevant actions and programmes; • integrating FNS concerns further and more comprehensively into the PRS process and other national development strategies and programmes, including strategies linking relief with development, and mainstreaming HIV/AIDS in relevant countries; • developing FS assessment, monitoring and evaluation systems, and integrating FS assessment and monitoring into poverty assessment and monitoring. 10

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AnnexSummary of Country and Project-specific Issues Related to the Lessons LearnedStudy of FS Policy Advisory Projects in Cambodia, Ethiopia, and MozambiqueThis annex summarises some important issues related to the individual country and projectcases, complementing the general lessons learned from all the FSPAPs in the threecountries as presented in the summary report. CAMBODIAThe Cambodian Food Security and Nutrition Policy Support Project (FSNPSP) started inNovember 2002 and terminated in December 2005. It was based on experience with aprevious IFSP supported by German TC in the Kampot Province, starting in 1996. The MoPwas the project partner, Mr. Peter Kaufmann the German Policy Adviser, and the projectbudget amounted to 1.8 million Euro.Institutional framework conditions and cooperation structures:• A complex institutional framework with partly unclear and/or overlapping responsibilities called for flexible and pragmatic approaches in project planning and implementation, guided by an orientation towards outcomes/development results.• The project partner (MoP) had overall planning functions but no implementation capacities, nor was it able to coordinate effectively with other ministries. To overcome this constraint, the project established a close working relationship with CARD. In addition to its role as coordinating body for agricultural and rural development, CARD has an overarching function with a hierarchical status above the line ministries, and was hence appropriately positioned to deal with FNS as a cross-sectoral issue.• Apart from MoP and CARD, the FSNPSP initiated and supported a number of other institutions, working groups and committees dealing with FNS issues at central and provincial level, in order to ensure better coordination and cooperation. The project was unable, however, to induce the institutional changes which would have been necessary to ensure effective coordination and implementation of FNS interventions.Fields of intervention:• A major field of activity of the FSNPSP was capacity building in FNS among all major actors involved in FNS planning and implementation. The project worked towards improving the cooperation and coordination structures among the various institutions.• The project was directly concerned with the integration of FNS issues into the National Poverty Reduction Strategy (NPRS) and the forthcoming National Strategic Development Plan (NSDP). Awareness of FNS issues increased among stakeholders, and the project was widely accepted as being competent in FNS matters. The project also worked towards developing indicators that could monitor FNS. 11

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• The FSNPSP worked towards improving the information and data basis on FNS in Cambodia, e.g. by assisting CARD in establishing and operating a web-based Food Security and Nutrition Information System (FSNIS) or by adapting, together with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), a standardised indicator base and data dissemination and presentation tool (CAMInfo).• In some strategic fields related to FNS, the project initiated and/or supported research and dissemination of a number of innovative approaches and best practices in fields such as the prevention and treatment of micro-nutrient deficiencies, a system of rice intensification, or an approach to identify poor and food-insecure households. In order to ensure continuation of such activities, the project liaised with other institutions and organisations. ETHIOPIAThe policy advisory project in Ethiopia started as a Food Security Capacity BuildingProject in May 2002 and was merged into a broader technical assistance (TA) programme,the “Sustainable Use of Natural Resources for Food Security (SUN)”. The partner ministry atthe central level is the MoARD. The SUN Programme draws on the experience of an IFSP inthe Amhara region, and maintains operational units in three regions where it works closelywith the regional Food Security Coordination Offices (FSCOs) and natural resourcesdepartments. The Programme Coordinator is Mr. Winfried Zarges.Institutional framework conditions and cooperation structures:• Networking, coordination and cooperation mechanisms with the government and other donor agencies at national and regional levels are necessary in order to make use of complementarities and to achieve synergies. In Ethiopia suitable fora exist for such purposes, such as the Coalition for Food Security, the Productive Safety Net Programme and technical working groups. The TC programme is an active member of these fora.• Most cooperation partners concerned with implementation appreciated the overarching functions of the policy advisory component, which helped conceptually to link the various initiatives together under common FNS objectives and strategies.• In order to ensure sustainability, deliberate efforts need to be made to institutionalise the FNS interventions, i.e. to integrate them into established governmental and non- governmental structures and procedures, rather than to implement the measures under a special TC programme, as is still largely the case in Ethiopia.Fields of intervention:• Successful implementation of FNS strategies depends on FNS awareness, capacities and resources at all levels – by focusing in particular on and contributing to capacity building of decentralised structures and public and non-public service providers, the TC programme helped fill critical gaps at this level.• Policy advice is more effective if linked to the implementation of innovative approaches and best practices at target group level. Thus, it helps to demonstrate the feasibility of approaches and tangible impacts. The TC programme has been particularly strong in producing and disseminating a number of technical innovations and examples of 12

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best practices (e.g. Triticale (seeds), incentive-for-work programmes, gully rehabilitation, etc.).• The three-level approach applied in Ethiopia allowed information and experience on innovative approaches and best practices to be fed back from the field to the regional and national levels, thereby integrating such experiences into the national and regional FNS strategies and making them operational. To this end, special efforts must be made to document such experience systematically and to publicise them more widely. MOZAMBIQUEFollowing the World Food Summit in 1996, the Mozambican Cabinet elaborated and adopteda national Food Security and Nutrition Strategy (ESAN), and the MoARD was mandated tocoordinate its implementation by establishing food security secretariats (SETSAN) at centraland provincial levels. Based on previous German-supported IFSPs in two provinces, theMoARD requested advisory support for implementing and updating the strategy. The FSPAPstarted in 2000 and terminated in December 2005; Mr. Alberto Vega-Exposito was the FSpolicy adviser during the second phase. The project budget amounted to up to 3 million Euro.Institutional framework conditions and cooperation structures:• For coordinating and implementing the national FNS strategy, food security secretariats were established at central and provincial levels, hosted by the MoARD. Due to cross-sectoral FNS issues, it was found that attaching these secretariats to the Ministry of Planning and Development (MPD) would have been a more appropriate solution. The MPD also hosts the Secretariat that is in charge of supervising the PRS process. The situation in Mozambique is the complete opposite of Cambodia, where the MoP was found to be too weak to coordinate cross-sectoral implementation of the FNS strategy (see above). This calls for a careful assessment of institutional mandates and capacities before the posting of policy advisers, and for partners with implementation mandates and capacities to be integrated.• In spite of efforts by the FSPAP to strengthen the provincial secretariats, they remained rather weak. Their performance was severely constrained by a lack of budgetary resources for covering operational costs and for implementing FNS activities.• Based on lobbying for FNS by the FSPAP and recommendations made by the donor coordination group on Poverty Analysis and Monitoring (PAMS), FNS concerns will be more explicitly integrated into the second PRSP (PARPA II) for the period 2006-2009. This, however, has not yet led to institutional changes. It appears extremely difficult for policy advice to induce such changes.Fields of intervention:• Initial attempts to promote the implementation of the FNS strategy largely failed because of the institutional constraints (see above). As a consequence, policy advisory support has shifted towards integrating FNS into the PRS process. 13

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• The collection and analysis of relevant data has helped create public awareness regarding FNS, and has facilitated the mainstreaming of FNS concerns into national development and sector strategies, particularly the preparation of the second PRSP.• A successful implementation of FNS strategies depends on sensitising decentralised public and non-public actors, ensuring their cooperation and developing mechanisms for decentralised planning and resource allocation. The FSPAP has paved the way towards this end by preparing guidelines for the integration of FNS into decentralised district planning, for the integration of FNS interventions into the annual operational and budget planning, and for the preparation of feasibility studies and project proposals. Nevertheless, it still has to be demonstrated that these guidelines are actually being applied.• The FSPAP has developed a shared monitoring and evaluation system at provincial level based on result chain analysis, which is designed to involve all relevant actors. However, since it remains unclear whether this system is already being applied, its practical application (as per the guidelines mentioned above) may require some further advisory support. 14